Trinian

by Elizabeth Russell

  To Trinian, young, hot-blooded, fiercely loyal, and trying to prove himself, his person was paramount. He had to show the people, through deed and love, that he was their own, their king, their protector. And he was willing to sacrifice all of himself to prove it.

  This journey to gather reinforcements was to make sure his people would be safe when he finally left them: when he left to face down the god of Karaka. He would win – perhaps he would die, but he would win – and Drian would be safe at last.

  “Everything,” Trinian said again, and Kett only lay down again, tears flowing unseen.

  Trinian did not sleep again, but sat upright in a corner of the cell until he heard the shouts and cries without – the war-cries for which he had been waiting. Presently, a handful of mixed company, his soldiers and Denin’s, descended to the dungeon and freed Trinian and his servant.

  “The throne room is ours,” Gorj declared.

  * * *

  Trinian performed the coronation ceremony as he imagined the ceremonies of centuries ago had taken place; and before a court of outlaws and a crowd of happy citizens, he crowned Denin as steward of the emperor and king of Kara.

  “Do you swear to protect the citizens in your power?”

  “I swear.”

  “Do you swear to guard the weak against the strong, to maintain peace over war, to provide necessities to those who have none?”

  “I swear.”

  “Do you swear to maintain peaceful associations with the other countries of Minecerva, and to foster well the relationship between your country and the land of Drian?”

  “I swear.”

  Trinian was about to strike Denin’s shoulder with the flat of his blade and complete the ceremony, when he paused. Something tugged at the back of his mind: Rordan and Mercy and Justice swirled together there, and Power too. He could not ignore them, and he asked one more question.

  “Do you swear to follow the statutes of the divine so long as they are just, right, and merciful?”

  Denin glanced sharply at him from where he knelt on his knees. He had not expected this question, and it was clear he did not want to swear to something he did not understand. But after a momentary hush, he answer firmly, “I swear.”

  “Then, with the authority given me from on high, I crown you King Denin of Kara. May your reign be long and prosperous. Long live the king!”

  The cheers resounded from wall to wall, the clamor rising to the heavens.

  XIII

  HOPE

  “There is some good in this world, and it’s worth fighting for.”

  - J.R.R. Tolkien, The Two Towers

  83

  Habas Holds the Fort

  Habas watched the princesses, prince, queen, and warrior depart into the shadow of the mountain. He watched until he could not even pretend to see the black speck of their caravan, and then he turned back to his abode. Surely, now… surely, he had treated them with all the grace and charity he ought. Surely, his trials were at an end, and he could pass on in peace. But he stopped still as a cold shudder ran through him. He suddenly felt evil very near. So near, it froze the blood in his veins. And it was coming ever nearer.

  He ran to his hermitage and climbed to the top of the southern wall. He looked out toward Karaka in the south and his eyes widened with astonishment.

  Four of the gods were descending toward his abode.

  He stilled his trembling and stood tall to receive them.

  “You do me a great honor,” he said with a bow, when they landed before him. They were so tall that they stood eye to eye with him even though he was on the wall and they on the sand. Twenty yards behind them there stood at attention an army of at least three hundred gorgans, waiting for the gods to command them to attack.

  One of the four was a goddess. She was seductively beautiful and he gasped at the pull she had even for an ancient denizen like himself. He knew all the gods by name, though he had never met them in person, and knew this must be Passion. He did not look at her long.

  Another was wild-eyed, wild-haired, and fierce of bearing. His mighty fists shook with anticipation, and the air about him trembled with pieces of floating debris, as if nothing he destroyed could ever quite settle to the ground; and beside him jumped, like an impatient cricket, a young-eyed, grinning monster, who was more utterly handsome than the most beautiful mortal man. Destruction and Terror.

  Finally, in the center of the group, there wavered a being vague of form. He seemed to be both spirit and corporeal, man and mist; he seemed less alive than any of the others, but more terrifying, more intelligent, and more powerful than all three put together.

  This fantastic god puzzled Habas and he stared at him in horror. The only possible reason he should look like that, the only unthinkable reason, was that he attempted to claim an eternal stake in the physical, passing realm. Why would any high god wish to rule the earth when he could reign over the heavens?

  “I have come for the mortals.” Though his form was vague and undefined, the timbre of his voice rattled Habas in his core. This was Power.

  They wanted the mortals. His banishment was nearly ended, and now the gods came to demand a gift from him. If he refused to give them up, they could well extend his sentence for another twelve hundred years; but if he betrayed the Nian family, then surely that went against Fate’s injunction. But Fate was not here now.

  He opened his mouth – and caught himself. He had not spent all these years in solitude so he could go from arrogance to blindness. These gods were evil, and he had no right, they had no right – he would not betray his guests.

  “They are gone – beyond your reach. You will not find them.”

  Terror screeched and Habas clutched his pounding chest in fright. Power leaned down to his ear.

  “You cannot stop us,” he whispered, and Habas breathed quickly.

  “If it’s the last thing I do, I will surely stop you,” the old man said, and then he drew upon his ancient birthright, and summoned the full strength of a wizard.

  Ancient power surged within him and he clenched his fists, willing it to build, to fill him, to flow over. From within, a bright light glowed. Without, the wind rose and swirled about him. In moments, a mighty sandstorm whistled about his ears, deafening all else.

  Power roared with rage and threw himself upon the wizard. There was an instant of eerie silence, and then a vociferous explosion blasted the desert. Sand, fire, wind, and stone blended together in a whirling cloud, blowing apart and rocking the three gods back so that they had to strain in the wind, and the army behind them was blown over.

  When the dust cleared, there was nothing left of the old hermitage, the hermit, or the oasis. Power was on his knees in the midst of the empty desert, gasping for breath and control. The army, in a mass of angry confusion, struggled back to its feet.

  After that, though they searched long and hard for the travelers, driven on by Power’s rage and tantrums, they did not find them. The gods flew across the entirety of the desert and screeched with anger, blasting the ground into clouds of flying sand, but to no avail. In his last moments, the wizard had cast an enchantment of concealment over them, and the gods could not break it.

  Power’s emotions were overflowing, but he stationed groups of gorgans to remain in parts of the desert, with Destruction overseeing the siege; then, bitter and raving, he returned to his palace, crying out, “Where is Farsooth? Where is my army that will claim Drian?”

  * * *

  Resolve was waiting for the gods when they returned to Karaka, and she beckoned Passion to her.

  “I take it from the desperation in Power’s face that you were unsuccessful?”

  “They disappeared,” her sultry sister confirmed. “There was a wizard left over from the fourth century who hid them from our sight.”

  Resolve shook her head and her eyes flashed. “A minor setback, but Power acts as though he will explode at any moment. He has forgotten the true might of mortals, thinking they will be easily c
rushed, so that when they fight back, he loses all hope! And we are running out of time: the clock will strike twelve in a matter of mere seconds.”

  “He behaves more and more like a mortal every moment: he is ruled by fear, he lashes out against the smallest triviality… Sister, I am finding myself more and more called upon to control him. I am Passion! I do not wish to control, but to incite!”

  Resolve loved control: she lived for it, and now she smiled. “Leave him to me. He will answer to us, or he will find that our lust to control Minecerva may just outweigh his.”

  84

  Cracks in the Heart

  Though they had dreaded the return to the heat and desolation of the desert, it was not of long duration, for suddenly, all about them, the desert erupted into blasts, sending sprays of sand and rock into the air, and they fled quickly until they were soon under the protecting shadow of the Yellow Mountain, and they watched the phenomenon in safety.

  Habas had equipped them with food, clothing, fresh blankets, and most importantly, water; but it was not the things he gave them so much as the fact that they had been given something, which raised their spirits and gave the demi-god and royal women courage to complete the final leg, and now, as they stood gazing to the stark stretches of the cloud-covered peak, with an exploding desert at their backs, their spirits rose.

  “It’s so tall!” cried Jacian in excitement.

  Garrity pointed above and to the left, “There is a steep step up here, and then it looks like a winding path over there. The climbing may be steep at times, but I think we will not have to scale any cliffs.” He jumped up to the rock and reached down to help Cila up.

  Adlena put a hand over her stomach, and Viol reached out and took her sister-in-law’s hand in her own.

  “Come on,” the girl smiled, “I’ll help you.”

  Adlena took her hand as Jacian cried out ‘me too!’, but she looked up at Garrity with a knowing trust, as if to say, ‘If they cannot help, I know it would be nothing for you to carry me to the peak.’

  Discomfited, Garrity could not hold her gaze, and Lavendier noted the odd interaction. Her heart still stinging from their fight, she waited till the others had gone on, then said, “She does know about you,” as he reached down a hand to help her up.

  He grunted as he pulled her to the ledge. “Somehow.”

  He moved to go on, but she put herself in his path and did not move. He clearly did not want to talk to her, but she hung her head and spoke anyway, “I’m sorry for what I said to you.”

  “We should join the others.”

  “Garrity, please,” she looked up at him but he was looking away into the distance. “I know not how she knows. I promise you I never said a word to her. I did not break our promise.”

  At last, he met her gaze. “I know,” he said heavily. “It was wrong for me to cast that upon you.”

  “Can you forgive me for using your past against you?”

  “I would like to say yes… I know not. I have never shared my story with anyone before, and to have it cast upon me… I do not wish to talk about it.”

  Roughly, his coat brushing against her shoulder, he pushed past her and followed the others. Tears were in her eyes as she turned to follow.

  * * *

  It was a challenge to climb the ascent, stumbling over rocks and ledges, and hauling each other up to safe routes, doubling back when they hit an impassable thicket or ditch. Three days of increasing lightheadedness, treacherous terrain, and aching legs brought about short tempers, which only escalated until finally Garrity lost his patience with Lavendier when she dropped her pack at a particularly difficult moment, sending it tumbling off a ledge.

  “That was the last of the bread from Habas, and now you’ll have to lie on the cold ground without a blanket!” he cried at her, and everyone stared in astonishment, for they had never seen Garrity lose his temper.

  Lavendier, her heart already over-heavy and overwrought, stumbled away, hiding behind a stone to dissolve into tears, and Garrity threw up his hands in frustration.

  “Garrity!” cried Viol, aghast.

  Adlena crossed her arms, and gazed at him sternly. “I have seen you build anger towards Lavendier in your heart the past few days,” she said bluntly. “Why?”

  He looked at her in surprise, but then decided he was finished being surprised by her looks and words, and answered, “She betrayed my trust.”

  “She broke a promise?”

  “No. She took something that I told her and used it against me, and then expected me to forgive her for it.”

  “Well, why will you not?” demanded Viol, but Adlena held up her hand.

  “You have forgiven Lavendier for many things,” the queen said calmly. “Why is this different?”

  He was floored, and for a moment only stood confounded. Cila took advantage of the pause to lead Jacian a little further up the mountain, her sore heart not able to bear any conflict among her loved ones.

  “I know not,” was his sullen response.

  “He is angry because Laven never sinned against him. He had never let her into his confidence before, but now that he has, he expects her to be perfect, and he’s mad because she fails,” broke out Viol in one long breath.

  “Your heart has been more pure than Lavendier’s for a long time,” Adlena said gently. “But now the tables have turned: Lavendier is finally a shining white star, and it is you who is clouding your heart with anger and resentment.”

  “How is it,” he cried out in frustration, “that you know so much about my heart?” It was not a rhetorical question: he had finally unleashed the root of his anger. Garrity had grown increasingly angry and sullen because, whether he confided in them or not, these women all seemed to know his deepest secrets; and he, a private man, resented the knowledge, intimacy, and presumption of their feminine understanding. “Stop telling me about myself! How do you know?”

  “It’s obvious,” said Viol simply. “I know you too well not to know when you are being an idiot.”

  He gazed hard at Adlena, demanding to know he knew not what. At last, she smiled so bright that her eyes glistened, and then she laughed. “I am a dryad, a spirit of the wood, Garrity, and I can see your heart as clearly as I see your face. I hid from my ability before, but I was repressing who I am, and now I tell you, because I can at last really see you for the first time, that you must forgive us all for loving you, before you poison yourself.”

  “Forgive you for… No, I am angry because she betrayed my confidence.”

  “No,” Adlena smiled, her heart at last released from her struggle to hide her inner sight. “That is not true. You are angry because you let her deep enough inside to hurt you, and now you are trying to banish her; but she will not be banished. You are a part of us all, now, and we will not leave you in peace.”

  Viol was smiling, her simple loving nature brightening in the light of Adlena’s happiness. For happiness was spilling over from the queen like an overfull glass, spreading to gather the affections of all her family together into her own, accepting them as she accepted herself, and challenging Garrity to do the same. “We may be set apart from them,” she finished softly, “but for that reason, we need them more than ever.”

  The thick wall, hedging Garrity’s heart about on all sides, split from top to bottom and he, with terrified resignation, gazed at Adlena in awe. He nodded, accepting Viol’s embrace as she ran to him.

  Then he stepped away from them and sought out Lavendier. Her heart fluttering with conflicting emotions, she received him as cordially as she could manage, and he stumbled forth an apology. With fresh tears, she welcomed the reconciliation, wishing he would say more but, as usual, he kept silence. However, as a proof of his effort to break down the walls that enclosed him, Garrity explained to her how Adlena knew his secret, and she accepted this small overture with hope for the future.

  At last, they were a united band; not only in fear and hounded pursuit, but in their love, openness, and belonging
to each other.

  85

  Perseverance

  “I think endurance,” reflected Viol to Lavendier as they struggled upward at a particularly steep moment in the mountain, “is the true test of strength of character. Trials are all well and good, and terribly difficult in their own right,” she grunted as she pulled herself up to the next cliff, “but to keep going when you are emotionally and physically spent, do you not think that is worse?”

  Lavendier extended a hand to her little sister and pulled her up so that they sat together on the same cliff face. She giggled, then chuckled, then laughed so hard that she gasped for breath in the high altitude.

  “What? What?” demanded Viol, smiling at her sister’s spirit and fishing out the water canteen.

  Lavendier drank and grew calmer. “I think I’m a bit giddy,” she said, “but really, I think endurance is a very amusing thing.” The rest of the caravan was ahead of them and had disappeared into a thick blanket of fog that obscured the further heights. Right at this ledge was the last place where they could see across the desert to the black pit of Karaka, and in the very far distance, the black and green cloud of trees that was the last hint of Mestraff. In all the vast expanse of the world, they were very alone. “Endurance means doing the hard things, because they are the things that are most worth doing.”